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Top 25 Edmond de Goncourt Quotes (2025 Update)

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Statistics is the first of the inexact sciences.”

1. “Statistics is the first of the inexact sciences.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “If there is a God, atheism must seem to Him as less of an insult than religion.”

2. “If there is a God, atheism must seem to Him as less of an insult than religion.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “There have been many definitions of beauty in art. What is it? Beauty is what the untrained eyes consider abominable.”

3. “There have been many definitions of beauty in art. What is it? Beauty is what the untrained eyes consider abominable.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “History is a novel that has been lived, a novel is history that could have been.”

4. “History is a novel that has been lived, a novel is history that could have been.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Genius is the talent of a person who is dead.”

5. “Genius is the talent of a person who is dead.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Surely nothing has to listen to so many stupid remarks as a painting in a museum.”

6. “Surely nothing has to listen to so many stupid remarks as a painting in a museum.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “She is unable to dream, think or love. In a woman, poetry never comes naturally, but always as the result of education. Only the woman of the world is a woman; the rest are simply females.”

7. “She is unable to dream, think or love. In a woman, poetry never comes naturally, but always as the result of education. Only the woman of the world is a woman; the rest are simply females.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “I have always derived indescribable pleasure from leading a decent woman to the edge of sin and leaving her there to live between the temptation and the fear of that sin.”

8. “I have always derived indescribable pleasure from leading a decent woman to the edge of sin and leaving her there to live between the temptation and the fear of that sin.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “A poet is a man who puts up a ladder to a star and climbs it while playing a violin.”

9. “A poet is a man who puts up a ladder to a star and climbs it while playing a violin.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “The facts: nothing matters but the facts: worship of the facts leads to everything, to happiness first of all and then to wealth.”

10. “The facts: nothing matters but the facts: worship of the facts leads to everything, to happiness first of all and then to wealth.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Princes enjoy themselves like children in the company of ordinary human beings.”

11. “Princes enjoy themselves like children in the company of ordinary human beings.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “As a general truth, it is safe to say that any picture that produces a moral impression is a bad picture.”

12. “As a general truth, it is safe to say that any picture that produces a moral impression is a bad picture.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “There are only two great currents in the history of mankind: the baseness which makes conservatives and the envy which makes revolutionaries.”

13. “There are only two great currents in the history of mankind: the baseness which makes conservatives and the envy which makes revolutionaries.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Man is a mind betrayed, not served, by his organs.”

14. “Man is a mind betrayed, not served, by his organs.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Laughter is the mind’s intonation. There are ways of laughing which have the sound of counterfeit coins.”

15. “Laughter is the mind’s intonation. There are ways of laughing which have the sound of counterfeit coins.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “The English are crooked as a nation and honest as individuals. The contrary is true of the French, who are honest as a nation and crooked as individuals.”

16. “The English are crooked as a nation and honest as individuals. The contrary is true of the French, who are honest as a nation and crooked as individuals.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Any man who does not see everything in terms of self, that is to say who wants to be something in respect of other men, to do good to them or simply give them something to do, is unhappy, disconsolate, and accursed.”

17. “Any man who does not see everything in terms of self, that is to say who wants to be something in respect of other men, to do good to them or simply give them something to do, is unhappy, disconsolate, and accursed.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “People don’t like the true and simple; they like fairy tales and humbug.”

18. “People don’t like the true and simple; they like fairy tales and humbug.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “A painting in a museum hears more ridiculous opinions than anything else in the world.”

19. “A painting in a museum hears more ridiculous opinions than anything else in the world.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Barbarism is needed every four or five hundred years to bring the world back to life. Otherwise it would die of civilization.”

20. “Barbarism is needed every four or five hundred years to bring the world back to life. Otherwise it would die of civilization.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Today I begin to understand what love must be, if it exists. When we are parted, we each feel the lack of the other half of ourselves. We are incomplete like a book in two volumes of which the first has been lost. That is what I imagine love to be: incompleteness in absence.”

21. “Today I begin to understand what love must be, if it exists. When we are parted, we each feel the lack of the other half of ourselves. We are incomplete like a book in two volumes of which the first has been lost. That is what I imagine love to be: incompleteness in absence.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “We asked ourselves whether, in these days of equality in which we live, there are classes unworthy the notice of the author and the reader, misfortunes too lowly, dramas too foul-mouthed, catastrophes too commonplace in the terror they inspire.”

22. “We asked ourselves whether, in these days of equality in which we live, there are classes unworthy the notice of the author and the reader, misfortunes too lowly, dramas too foul-mouthed, catastrophes too commonplace in the terror they inspire.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Debauchery is perhaps an act of despair in the face of infinity.”

23. “Debauchery is perhaps an act of despair in the face of infinity.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Historians tell the story of the past, novelists the story of the present.”

24. “Historians tell the story of the past, novelists the story of the present.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

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Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “Sickness sensitizes man for observation, like a photographic plate.”

25. “Sickness sensitizes man for observation, like a photographic plate.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “She was, so to speak, an impersonal creature, because of her great heart; a woman who did not belong to herself: God seemed to have made her only to give her to others.”

26. “She was, so to speak, an impersonal creature, because of her great heart; a woman who did not belong to herself: God seemed to have made her only to give her to others.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

Edmond de Goncourt Quote: “What is a vice? Merely a taste you do not share.”

27. “What is a vice? Merely a taste you do not share.”

— Edmond de Goncourt

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